Tag Archives: halti

So….when Luna was first introduced to the halti (gentle lead). It was a quick ,put it on, give her a treat ,drag her around kinda of thing. It was done in the pet store after a sales person noticed she was a puller. I thought this was a great thing for her as her pulling stopped immediately and she was now a joy to walk. However, Lu hates this thing. She sits while I put it one but her head is avoiding it and her tail goes stiff. I don’t like using it but with her leash aggression I find it the easiest to use in controlling her outbursts. ( I only put it on if I know we may encounter dogs)

I pointed this out to the behavior lady on Friday (she is encouraging me to use it) and she said she would send me a video to work on this and she will eventually be desensitized to it and may even enjoy it.

The lady in the video is really quick with her dog. But you get the idea.

The behavior lady said to take my time with this and do it over a few days. I tried it today and it actually works. Luna will now lift her head so that I can put the loop over her muzzle and no more stiff tail. I am sure after a week she will be feeling a lot better about her halti.

My goal is to never have to put this on her again. But for now it is a good tool to have while we work on her issue and having her more at ease about it helps.

HOWEVER….when I was using the halti for Luna’s pulling on the leash issue I noticed, as I am sure other people have, that when not wearing it she continued to pull. My goal at that time was the same as it is now…not to use the halti. So I worked very hard with Lu so she could walk very nicely beside me on a loose leash. This was achieved by working a lot without the halti.

So, of course, I questioned the BL about this because if I get Luna to respond appropriately with the halti on, what will happen when it comes off? And you know I respect the honesty in this lady; She told me that yes I would probably have to work at getting Lu to respond appropriately again but with any luck she may transfer what she already learned. But for now with it on she was not practicing losing her mind her usual response when she saw another dog.

So I guess we will see what will happen in the next few months. The prognosis is good and I still have hope.